Republican Outside Groups Build Big Lead in Fund-Raising

Republicans are building a huge lead in the race for campaign money for their roster of outside campaign organizations.

A group of the largest Democratic outside groups announced tonight that they raised a combined $19 million in 2011. By comparison, two of the GOP’s biggest outside groups raised a total of $51 million last year.

The four main Democratic groups – Priorities USA, Majority PAC, House Majority PAC and American Bridge – were founded last year to counter the rise of a new set of groups on the right, such as American Crossroads, which was founded with the help of Republican strategist Karl Rove.

The most prominent Democratic group, Priorities USA, was founded by two former aide to President Barack Obama in order to help the president’s reelection. The organization said it raised $6.7 million in 2011. By contrast, the Super PAC founded to support the presidential campaign of Republican Mitt Romney raised about $30 million last year.

The Majority PAC and the House Majority PAC were founded to help support Democratic candidates for Congress.

These outside campaign groups are relatively new to presidential campaigns. A string changes in the campaign-finance laws allows for the first time for organizations to raise and spend unlimited sums of money to support individual candidates Congress and the White House – provided that they don’t coordinate their activities with the candidates themselves.

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